Saving money on your energy bill is hard if you don’t have much to pay for green energy upgrades. Unfortunately, Home Energy Scotland (HES) has just made it even harder. Although installing solar panels on your home is far cheaper than it once was, it still needs a significant upfront investment.
But it pays for itself soon enough by slashing energy bills, while contributing to Scotland’s decarbonisation goals. To bust any misconceptions you may have, yes, solar panels work perfectly well here, even on the dreichest day. That’s why, with a just transition in mind, the Scottish Government made interest-free loans for solar available via the HES scheme.
Well, until they were suddenly unavailable. A year ago, HES (run by Energy Saving Trust Scotland) withdrew stand-alone loans for solar energy systems on homes, without warning. Since then, they have been available only when installed after, or alongside, a heat pump or storage heaters.
Of course, pairing heat pumps and solar panels is a great combination, especially with battery storage: combining free power from the sun, with free heat from the air or the ground. You also can’t run out of fuel – unlike oil, LPG, bottled gas or firewood. Up to £11,500 was available in grants and interest-free loans to put the three technologies together.
“Restricting access to a key decarbonisation technology flies in the face of meeting net zero by 2045 and directly contradicts the Scottish Government’s recognition of the role of.
